.all this is suggesting is: i'll meet you half-way; given that "this" question was always going to hover over "us", given that there's a disparity between English: a people, and English: a language... evidently the natives cannot begin to envision themselves as a lingua franca peoples... no wonder, their language has been "hijacked".... the "xenophobia", but like kevin spacey said: well, i'm here, am i suddenly supposed to, *******? playing the ******* *****-eyed poodle is not on the cards, but at the same time, it's hard to envision this language, as a people... given all the infringing demands of the anglo-saxon economic model into areas, where displacement is rife, subsequently... i can understand the concern of the natives, given that i didn't transgress the base principle: don't **** their women. see what a mild spaghetti-custard blip of history we're getting into? i am expected to integrate, but i'm not expected to integrate. i am somehow expected to be told to do what others want, but at the same time, i'm expected to protect my individual rights... no "parallel" anlogy akin to a catherine perry song? no kitty-*******, just around the corner? i can see islam... you know its prime sense of failure? that arabic would and never will, become given the same lingua franca status of english... you're complaining, or is it me stating the facts? evidently is a language reaches a lingua franca potentiality and subsequent expression, the natives will suffer... i'm not a native, but i can only imagine... what the consequences are... being ram-packed with excesses in ***** purchases... so much for a protected status of international economic ventures... like: i am waiting for the intra-national economic counters... can't see them coming, or i can see them, in a Casandra conundrum variation. there's still the topic of the natives... rarely can the English be allowed an outsider perspective without a sediment of their language being used, by a foreign entity... now, or never, why? you have somewhere important to be at as of: tomorrow? can you blame the natives, given that their language is a lingua franca, and not just, relegation to a national idiosyncracy "pH scale" differentiation? as a foreign entity, you know what i've learned from living on the most outer aspects of London? sure as **** it's not Cheltenham... i speak the tongue, i'm no genius, it's only English after all, it's hardly anything near Mandarin... what i feel sorry for, are the jihadi buggers who were born here, and were never taught their native sprechen... whatever the hell happened to English, and what Islam is jealous of, it came about naturally... arabic was never supposed
to become the standard bearer, the lingua franca of commerce and disinhibiting individuals entrenched... which, implies? i can look at the natives, with a more piercing dedication: excuses... excuses could be had, if, your, language, wasn't as "******" as it currently is... seems like i've reached a status of post-integration... now, i'm asking the language, the sort of application usage cruxes, that a native, simply wouldn't.

                         there's just so much
                           baggage,
that madmen
can carry,
for the "sane" standard
bearers of civilization,
of civility...
    at least some
of these outliers have
the *****
to not cower behind
an insanity plea...
     most of the madmen?
imagine
a tiger in a cage...
after a while...
          the tiger becomes
tamed by
zoological structuring
of its day-to-day...
and everyone's happy...
but that doesn't make
the tiger into a *******
bonsai, a feline "companion"...
beside the point...
  it's when some medical
conditions are slandered,
exposed to metaphor,
misnomer,
             that the madmen
receive the package
of social constraints
"levitating" just above
the state of being dormant...
but in this scenario:
well... that settles it...
now we know what
a level-playing-field looks like...
intellect,
and the debacle concerning
trust...
               well...
i've learned of trust
the upside-down way...
    relationships,
notably with a russian
specimen...
              me, ******,
why was i thinking i wouldn't
be ****** over?
   oh... right...
i can claim all
the responsibility with
what i "did" with a *******...
but when it comes
to the "affair" of a woman:
of free disposition,
i'm suddenly the culprit...
psychic trenches,
there "we" are,
entrenched in some plateau
of what seems to be
Belgium,
   and there "they" are,
entrenched in the same
plateau...
            sigh sigh, one more
for the party...
point being,
   people have not unearthed
the + + + + +
aspect of this debacle...
it's now a level playing field...
everyone is suspect,
everyone is limited...
a true: forensic quest for
democracy...
  all the other incidents
came and went,
always, as if: in passing...
  so this incident can also
come, and go, in passing...
solidarity to what?
to whom?
or rather: with?
            i can deal with this
sort of indigestion
surrounding my day to day,
but before long:
what other sop-story is
supposed to grab my attention?
clarity of intent,
   unlike someone experiencing
a psychotic break-down
of the psychic labyrinth...
a transcendence of
the categorical incentive...
somehow:
  the categorical imperative
was never supposed to mean:
what it meant to begin with...
the categorical imperative
has somehow lost the whole:
living by the standard
of a maxim...
               given that all maxims
are true...
  much harder to "test the waters"
with aphorisms...
            sure,
observable facts,
    then...
               disinhibited fictions...
glorification?
  today i had a problem
killing an ant...
   i was taking a ****
and had a problem killing
a moth that decided to freak
out the inanimate objects
of the bathroom...
       yeah: oh sure, sure,
i'm all for Herod's "conundrum"...
point being:
   we now know what
both sides feels...
         we now know...
       that there are outliers
on either side of the "debate"...
one: i am suspect,
but two: so is the counter-suspect...
no sacred cows...
   no: i think i'll just milk
a muslim in new dehli
for the jyst and thrill of a per se...
- at least now:
s.j.      w?
                or the conservative
mediator crowd of:
      there for the sake
of outrage only on the behalf
of outrage-in-itself?
past the phenomenon,
i can only return to the anti-phenomenon
of the noumenon (per se)...
which is not disappointing,
seeing how the whole "feel"
of it is begs the crux
fathomability of the individual...
just another skim read /
listen to the modern day
                          pharisee...
heavy sighs,
   blinded eyes...
frivolous waggling tongues...
but deep down,
most of the people are
content with having to experience
a revision...
  the revision being:
a level playing field...
   behring just attacked
the elites...
this?
    this dog ***** pile of
media attention?
         good...
        now everyone's uncertain...
i'm not afraid to think it,
and put it into writing...
    after a while:
   you just tire...
   you get tired of hearing
just one side of the story...

      what could leave someone
extreme: glee "riddled"
just leaves me exhausted...
     but at least the schizophrenics
are off the hook...
at least there's still some
belief in personal restraints...
even with a debilitating condition...
at least these people
are not facing the collateral
stereotyping of someone
with: the clarity of intent...

         there's just me, at this point,
thinking to myself:
and why did "they" drug me
to the point of:
making "them" feel uncomfortable...
clearly my mental faculties
have not been
                 car-crash dimished...

welcome the new hybrid...
soul mongrel...
           what is it about the polacks
that has made them so...
immune?
     i guess only recently
Poland has celebrated
the centenary of independence...
i wouldn't know,
i'm strapped to England
in metaphorical strait-jacket
  (what is metaphor
compared to metaphysics?),
   sober, drunk,
drunk, sober, etc.
               i was given a crash-course
in multiculturalism,
i guess i assimilated...
   back in school there was
the popular irish gang...
and there was "my" group...
of all the outliers...
   we used to spend lunch breaks
playing cards...
but when i heard news that
i would only be fully integrated,
once i gave up my native tongue
which i used to speak in
private?
    that broke the camel's back...
the centenary of independence
of Poland...
i wouldn't know...
i'm in "exile"...
   which is: economic "war"
came to where i come from
after the fall of the soviet pact...
and...
                every time i go back
to visit my grandparents...
i am only associated
with that country by speaking
the language...
and boy, it's not so ******* rosy
on the inside, compared to what
is being pushed to the outside...
Poland is like a: death-zone...
**** me, even the Hungarians
know how to ***** themselves
when it comes to tourism...

    i am, in "exile"...
            come to think of it,
most of the Muslims in the west
have it worse,
but i blame their parents...
i had one Pakistani friend
in high-school...
   now that i succumb to
reminiscence... yep...
he spoke perfect Urdu;
    but all these outliers?
   what their parents did...
****** themselves into
an integration mechanism...
not retaining their mother tongue?
like all these,
western jihadi prospects...
speak about 10 words of arabic,
and they are "attempting"
to compensate...
   i somehow feel for them,
a complete mine-field
of a mind-****...
       like being impreganted
by a virus,
a cancer...
     the linguistic dysphoria...
so yeah: if everyone would please
like to make heavy scrutiny
of the blatantly obvious,
regarding the genital region,
and forget a sobering note of
worthwhile problems,
namely the language dysphoria
of muslims, in England,
feel free to keep looking
at the genital "problem"...
            
clearly there's a dysphoria horizon,
i would know,
given that i have retained
my mother tongue...
but they haven't...
               and all they want is probably
so little...
   i remember that my father
once called me
the bellybutton of the world...
referencing me as
   an english child...
  that's how the Polacks view
the English: the bellybuttons
of the world, center of attention,
yada yada...
                 gender "dysphoria"...
you have to be *******
kidding me...
              what about the language
dysphoria of Muslims
                    in the (v)vest?

jak to się mówi:
            tym co się od razu, ma?

i can understand the language
dysphoria, well,
being a 1st generation immigrant...
i can't imagine being
born to 1st generation immigrants,
not retaining my native
tongue,
   knowing only the tongue
of integration,
   it would feel alien...
   like i was impregnated
by a foreign body,
   retaining nothing of my "******"
natural resources...
so... the problem we've arrived at
is very real...
  more real than gender dysphoria...

hopefully i'm less "schizoid"
at the end of this marathon,
and more: relieved to be merely
bilingual...
entrenched bilingual -
            so no, not a polymath...
or rather: not a polyglot;
my maternal great-grandfather
apparently was,
spoke 7 languages,
disappeared somewhere near
Niagara Falls...

   the plan was: England, stop-over...
via Argentina
   and toward the U.S.,
****... seems i was side-tracked
into remaining,
being shackled to these isles.

dysphoria
is sitting in front of a mirror
for 30 straight minutes
picking out the tiny things
that make people misgender you.

trying to pull back your chest
pretending you have a flat one
scratching down your biceps
because maybe if they were more toned
you would be called a boy
clawing at your thighs
because if they were small and beautiful
then people might think you are a he

dysphoria
is sobbing while doing all of that
the mirror is now your enemy
giving you a million things to change
but you have no way of changing it.

maybe sleeping will help?
that is if you get past your thoughts
of your disgusting body
calm down for a bit to even let you slip into somber.

but then dreams come
you dream of being on testosterone
having a beard with a deep voice
maybe even your top surgery
where you no longer have to deal with having a chest

but you wake up
no way of getting these things
it haunts you for days.

dysphoria
is the mirror no longer being
a place to just fix up your hair or do your make up
it’s where your demons live
passing by a reflective surface
and seeing even a glance of your body
makes you want to die and tear it apart

dysphoria
is someone brushing against your thigh
and you wanting to puke everything
you have ever eaten
because they touched your body
a disgusting girls body
it can’t be mine
but I hate it none the less

dysphoria
is someone taking out your soul and choking it
the lack of breath comes from a panic attack
your nails clawing and digging into your skin
because this can’t be you. this isn’t mine
this body needs fixing
so does this soul.

Dysphoria, it wraps and weaves but plunges me like a knife,
Dysphoria, it's like a big useless chest binder that tightens around your self-esteem.
Dysphoria, It is my best friend, but I smile in joy when it briefly leaves.
Dysphoria, My thighs, my chest, my hair, my jaw, my eyes and my smile write 'Her' 'She' 'Female' Girl'.

                                  Dysphoria, I'm always alone.

dysphoria can be defined as a general unease or dissatisfaction, a discontent
but dysphoria
feels more like a disconnect
my heartbeat feels more like a defect
when it throbs against my shrinking ribcage I can feel that it's making a dent
dysphoria
comes from a greek root meaning "hard to bear"
it is hard to bear
****, it's hard to breathe
literally
physically
I cannot breathe
I cannot be free
dysphoria is when you have to close your eyes while you shower so you can't see
each breath shakes as it comes out of me
there is medical material clung so tightly to my body
it has become an extension of me
and nothing on me belongs to me
I am trapped beneath waves of what I can't stand to be
my body of water
feels more like an anchor
I am drowning
and you can tug at my spine but you cannot feel me
I cannot even feel me
I would do anything to make these ends meet
dysphoria grabs hastily
a current does not care your worth, it just pulls you under
dysphoria does not care if you deserve better
dysphoria is a disconnect
and I haven't found directions
to the end

Dysphoria
you are not wanted
people hate you
they just want to feel normal

But you stop that
dysphoria
you are not needed
the pain you give people

You make them struggle
hurt
cry
but

Dysphoria you are also good
you help people understand
they are not who they are told
you help them get to who they really are

Dysphoria
you are bad and good
painful
but you are also helpful

.i'd call it as far as deciding upon: ethno-dysphoria... given that the lingua franca doesn't like to entertain hyphen "riddled" word compounds, and how german never bothered with the hyphen... i'm pretty much convinced that ethno-dysphoria exists... i guess only the jews are immune to this phenomenon, as... i'm pretty sure, the dutch are... i once overheard an american talk to a dutch girl before ******* her in some park in stockholm: who cares about the dutch? what? more the people, or the language? the english language doesn't give a **** about either language or the respective people utilizing it... oh i think ethno-dysphoria is real, more real than any gender-"dysphoria"... no ****-wit from the gender-"dysphoria" camp will **** you... but sure as pork-chops and potato crisps... an ethno-dysphoria case will, "somehow" become a jihadi.

oh sure, i'm all for "free speech",
until the time comes,
and it usually does,
around the same time,
that these advocates
                   are given a: script.
yeah:
when they are asked to read
a "typo" interface...
               when the, said,
"freedom", is allowed to be
scrutinized,
   under the barrage...
     of "mishandling" literacy...
most of these free speech advocates
do not welcome
                reading,
printed words...
                     co-defendants...
funny, this, "barometer"...
   you are given the freedon
to speak freely...
   let's see how free you are...
when being asked to:
     read "freely"...
      see the disparity?
   people don't have a freedom
of speech,
when they are exposed
to reading material...
    given that exposure to reading
material,
          doesn't coincide
with the final statement
      of the ecclesiastical class...
relieving their literacy monopoly...
i'll take two examples...
both are instances
of a freedom of speech advocates...
one is given a script to read,
the other is not given a script...
just like Kierkegaard predicted:
some people are
just more concerned with
a freedom to speak,
                         rahter than think...
i'd say:
   as much freedom as your
reading ability entitles you
to entertain...
          this, "freedom" of speech...
i'm freely allowed to breathe...
this cul de sac of freedoms...
  different matter
when you hear the so-called
advocates of "freedom"
recite a draft of reading...
god-forbid they begin
entertaining diacritical markers!
yet you notice the differnece
between free speech: ignored,
and the same freedom,
coinciding with an ability
to read?
                  free speech was,
once upon time depicted
by joyce and the plagiarized sartre:
andsoitwascocerningadepictionakintothis...

      never mind the
aesthetic constraints
of punctuation marks...
that's freedom...
breaking from aesthetic constraints
of encoded speech...
           you can hardly find
anything suspect,
within the concerns
of the pedantic community...

enlighten me...
   i'm pretty sure
the same assortment of freedoms,
associated with
the "confines" of a non-script,
would be missing,
should a script emerge,
and the whole lot of us
would be left,
with something,
akin to making a signature
akin to the X marker;

     who said anything about
stripping this freedom,
what i was implying was...
some of us care about
punctuation & conjunctions;
as free as you want to be...
point being:
this, "freedom" of speech...
infiltrated by written text,
being read (no variant
past participle spelling
variation outside of: red)...

    this "freedom",
is only a freedom,
when being freed from
reading, scripted, text;
now posit the same advocates
against
    a page of script...
freedom? what freedom?!
unless we all forget
to write,
     and join the simmering
**** of: the all of us,
in the blah blah parade...
maybe i'm being overtly
pedantic...
            a "freedom" of
speech would,
subsequently,
imply:
            no point
in clinging to scripted speech,
esp.,
with a decision to
impose punctuation markers.

Dysphoria is like having to *****.
You're sitting there, weak and trembling;
every movement becomes twisted into a bout of nausea.
You're pale and helpless; held captive by your sickness

Every fiber of your body aches to oust the illness
A vile purgation, stinging and hot against your throat
Waves and waves of sickness pouring out of your body
Until finally, feeble and wavering, you stand.

And the color begins to come back to your face.
A relief of all the gross and disgusting feelings
Allowing you to lay down again and rest
Without your head swimming with blight.

But that is not dysphoria.
There is no purge
There is no relief.
You are hit again and again with this nausea

No hope for an end
With every breath, your stomach churns
With every movement, your body shakes
Your eyes are closed and you bite your lip;
Any action can only serve to entice the disease.

No medication could ever relieve such a force
Of this malady, this fever, this ailment.
Nothing can calm the tides of dysphoria.

So, you ask,
How would I explain it?
Well certainly, as something
Not fun.
It's like...
It's like carrying a leach around with you.
When I walk, I can feel it,
It is a dead weight on my chest,
******* the life from my arms,
Making my hands and face slender,
What should be full and strong
It's like...
It's like when you're sick to your stomach.
That feeling of tar in your gut,
But instead of being isolated, it's everywhere
Throughout your body,
It makes you feel sick everywhere.

This is how I explain dysphoria:
Have you ever looked in the mirror,
And wanted to just rip all your hair out?
When a bad hair day gets out of hand,
Have you ever felt the need to just start over?
Even when you tear out a clump of hair
And your scalp looks raw and a little ******,
But you keep going anyway,
Just to get rid of that stupid haircut?
...no?
Alright, how about,
When you're watching the outtakes of a 3-D animated movie,
the scenes that have "gone wrong",
When the girl's eyes are far too big and pop out of her face,
Her arms are disconnected from her chest,
Her head moves but her teeth do not,
And you just want to scream "DELETE IT!"
Because it's obvious that someone has ******* up here,
And this nightmare, this fever dream
Is not what they intended their creation to look like.

Alright, well have you ever
Done a pencil drawing?
And you've put a lot of time and effort into it,
You're so proud,
This is one of your best works,
But something about it is just off?
You might not be able to tell what it is,
This will bother you for a long time,
You will spend hours on end thinking
About what exactly separates this piece of art from everything else,
What it is that keeps it from perfection...
Until suddenly one day, you realise,
You notice exactly what's wrong,
You grab an eraser to fix your mistake
But then, oh no
Your eraser was *****,
And when you tried to rub out that single wonky line,
You leave a huge black smudge across your paper
And now there's no way to get rid of it
All your work on this piece, ruined,
And you're really upset,
You were so proud of this drawing,
It was so close to being perfect,
It could have been so beautiful,
It was almost perfect, but now...

But now, it's wrong.
It just looks wrong
It just IS wrong,
It wasn't meant to look like this
I am trying to explain as simply as I can
That this body is wrong,
That it wasn't meant to look like this,
That it wasn't meant to BE like this!
Don't you understand?
This is how I explain dysphoria:
Have you ever looked in the mirror
And wanted to just rip your chest out?
Do you ever see your body, your parts seeming broken,
Your chest, legs, hear the sound of your voice
And just scream "DELETE IT!"
Because it's obvious that someone
Has ******* up
Someone was using a ***** eraser
When they created me, erased me,
And they've left smudges, mistakes, that I
Cannot get rid of,
And however hard I try to pretend
That I don't care,
I do,
And I still feel the need to erase them.
These leaches that I carry around,
They drain me,
And I was so proud of myself
I,
This body...

It could have been so beautiful

Anxiety is not stress.
Anxiety is not some umbrella term you can use to describe how you feel when your favorite character in a book is in an intense battle unless you can somehow feel how fast their heart is beating until you can feel how hot their blood is until you can feel what it’s like to be that character in that situation the weight of the world on your shoulders
Anxiety is not finding lighting candles to be the only solution, candles are another problem. Another long paragraph to your list of “Things That Can Easily **** Me” example: “I didn’t leave any matches out, did I? I blew out the candle right? I need to check. Do I smell burning?? PUT THE CAP WHEN IT’S DONE! Will set off my fire alarm? Does my fire alarm work? Where’s my fire alarm??? Where’s somewhere I can put it so it doesn’t hurt me. THIS IS OK THIS IS NORMAL THIS IS RELAXATION.”
Anxiety is not stress.
Anxiety is horrible flashing images, constant reminders, the most negative form of “what if” imaginable.
Anxiety is wasting all your time thinking about an 8 page paper due for class in a week but instead of bringing yourself to writing it you are sobbing on the floor thinking of how bad for your grade this will be.
Anxiety is having a crush on a girl and trying out makeup for the first time.
Anxiety is having a crush on a guy and wondering if your sense of humor is funny enough.
Anxiety is not stress.
Anxiety is downloading an app that checks on your health and leaves you wondering how long this has been going on for.
Anxiety is wondering how to fix your eating disorder instead of actually fixing it
Anxiety is outing yourself to fit in
Anxiety is always wearing pants because you’re too afraid of your own scars
Anxiety is staying up countless nights crying crying crying you cannot yell your thoughts are no longer your own
Anxiety is writing a list of pros and cons to killing yourself
Anxiety is lighting a candle so you can slowly burn the list because
Anxiety is telling you if someone finds out, you will die.
Anxiety is not stress.
Anxiety is having making a friend and losing them in less than a year
Anxiety is wondering if all this help is helping or do I need to help myself
Anxiety is your friends questioning you non-stop are they really questioning you or do you question yourself?
Anxiety is memorizing the suicide prevention hotline
Anxiety is beating yourself up countless times “How could you forget something as simple as a Birthday?!”
Anxiety is “I only have three friends and one hates me, one I’m trying not to lose, and the other I love too much to tell the truth”
Anxiety is “It’s only a matter of time before we all die!”
Anxiety is “Congratulations! Two of your friends have died this year alone! One ******* hates you! Oh! HAHA! Wait! They all ******* hate you!”
Anxiety can turn you from “Wow. I look kinda good today.” to ”DYSPHORIA! DYSPHORIA! DYSPHORIA!”
JUST ******* KIDDING!
ANXIETY IS STRESS!
AND MUCH
MUCH
MORE!!!!!!!!

It's not simple
It's rusted nails breaking skin
Lightning flashes in a hurricane
The crack of a body hitting the pavement

It's the pinch of nails in your palms
The tremble of your legs when you think they're watching
The ache in your chest when your binding is too tight
But not tight enough

It's not a stormcloud, it's a typhoon
It's not a discomfort, it's torment
Its the steel beams in your chest snapping under pressure
Your skeleton crumbling so maybe your chest will be flat then

But all those rusted nails and steel beams
Heated by the fire and fury of passion
Remold into something new

Someone who can stand a bit straighter
Speak louder
Tip their chin up
And show the world who they are
Who he is.

Dysphoria is a skyscraper crumbling to ash
But it's also scraps of wreckage
Reminded into a safe haven
A place of rest
A place of comfort

my gender dysphoria
plays the part of schoolyard bully
punching me in the face
with all the things i am doing
that make me less of a man

i spit something back
no room for being witty here
cotton candy pink and blue
stains my teeth
drips down my chin

girlhood feels like a rot
deep within this body
that i am slowly sculpting
into a shape
that doesn’t make me want to
hack it to pieces

but you call me “she”
and dysphoria gets in
another fist
and i can no longer tell
if i am crying
from the pain of you so
callously misgendering me again
and again and again
or the betrayal
because i thought we were friends

but you call me “she”
and so many things break inside me
seven year old me
feeling too big for a body that
is already like dragging
around a coffin
shrinks under the fear
of not knowing what i am

but you call me “she”
and dysphoria drives a foot
into my ribs
grows into this thing
that is too big for me to
keep inside and it comes
out as confrontation that all
too quickly gives way
to tears

because i did not
languish inside of myself
for nine years
stumbling through trying to be
a lesbian and nearly dying
as a girl
for you to call me “she”

i did not spend $175
on changing my name and gender marker
to reflect who i have always been
*******
for you to call me “she”

i did not make the decision
to have a needle the length
of my pinkie and
roughly the size of a pencil led
stuck in my lower back for
the rest of my life
for you to call me “she”


i did not risk
shortening my life span
to 40 years
instead of the 75 or 80 it should be
because people destroy what
is different
for you to call me “she”

i did not survive through
who i used to be
to become the man i am today
for you to throw this
gender i never asked for
back into my face
no matter how many times
i plead with you to
just give enough of a ****
to get it right

i do not get back up
every time that my gender dysphoria
is made stronger by someone
like you who
so you can look
me in the face
see the tears in my eyes
the tremor in my hands
and still call me “she”

the proverbial blood
that runs through my veins
taking on the colors of a sunset
drips onto your hands
because you can’t see past
the things i can’t control
the things i am able to change

you can’t see the man
that i already am
that i always have been
and you still can’t give me
a good reason as to

why why why
you can look at me
with my visible ****** hair
the button clearly stating
my pronouns as he and him
how i light up when someone
calls me sir or mister
and still stoop so low
as to add fuel to the fire
that is my gender dysphoria
by calling me “she”

(what the **** is your problem?)

"There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you."
-Maya Angelou

My soul is a sweetie:
She’s a cute but ****,
with an infectious smile,
an enchanting personality.
She wears dark colors,
slightly goth makeup,
and thick-rimmed glasses.
She likes candles, tea,
sweaters, and cannabis,
and goes on long walks
in the woods by starlight.
She’s cool and confident,
outgoing and fun,
and as beautiful as
a moonrise reflected
off of a frozen lake.

She’s me.
But I am not her.
She’s the me inside
of the me inside of me.

She cries when my mind
grapples with the bounds
of the mental illness
that gives her life.
She screams in pain
when my mind tries
to rationalize her
and explain her away.
And she glows with joy
whenever I try
to grow closer to her.
She’s the part of me
I never asked for,
whose existence hurts
like a deep burn,
but nonetheless makes
me truly be myself.

the generic sounds of
car horns and screeching tires
mixed with the stagnant smell
of smog and cigarette smoke
linger around the perimeter
of my mind

finely placed cracks
along my heels
and lips
drip bits
of me
onto
the
street
leaving behind
my skin
as if to say
"This is me, world. This is all I am."

the washed up,
frail bits of humanity
struggle and fight
to stay valid

but nobody remembers, anymore

and if it weren't for dysphoria,
I doubt we'd feel much at all

we are merely reminders
of yesterday
and without our sweaty hands
shaking each other
there will be no way
to tell what is
and what has been

She had always been on guard with her feelings.
She never let her emotions rule her.
Yet that night…
that night was not different than any other nights.
She still felt lonely.

Yes, he was there
she felt him…
inside her
he touched her
but it was too superficial.

He touched her,
she felt him,
but that’s it.
Their bodies collided,
but never their soul.

Inside, her whole being was bleeding…
aching…
longing…
for that gentle, genuine touch
from the other
but all he gave her
were fierce and mighty
stabs of
uncertainty.

Yes, it was pleasure,
but it only lasted
so brief that when
she opened her eyes
he was gone.

She needed someone to complete her.
She thought it will be him,
but he was just another coldblooded bandit.
Stealing…
destroying…
everything he can
off of her,
leaving her wrecked
and sore.

She lay there…
her heart shouting in
pain rhyming with the
silence of the night.

She lay there…
her eyes closed,
but her soul
wide open.

Waiting….
waiting for
someone to pick her up.

Waiting…
waiting for
everything to fade into
oblivion.

It's the voice in the back of your head
It's the feeling of yourself in the shower
It's the clothes that line your curves to well
It's the stare of all those around you

It's the screaming of the wind
It's the force if the tornado
It's the hail from the cold skies
It's the wave of the tsunami
It's everything crashing down on you at once

It is hell's demons here to plague you personally

Golden hour daughter
Splitting eyes gouging light—
Harboring disfunction, not
Finding sensory stimulation
Beyond illusion— overactive/>

Am I a life force,
Or a chair for it to sit?

Stitching pixels to form—
A drive to keep an open
Ripped rib wind— about  
My drouth stomach,
Itching, salivating…

you cannot help but hate your body
the gangly limbs
the stomach that sticks out entirely too far
the freckles that dot your face
you ******* hate yourself
every mirror you look at is a reminder of what a total piece of **** you are
so when you start to float, it's a relief

the feeling of not being you is something entirely new
the arms that are not your arms
legs that are not your legs
eyes that you can't see through

and better
you aren't a ******* girl anymore
this is always the worst part
you can ******* deal with everything else
you can
but not that

because you are not female
and you know this
except
except you are

the binders lying on the floor are telling you that you aren't actually
they love that word
actually
shout it in the hallways and whisper in hushed conversations that they know you can hear

actually

the sensation of being ripped out of your own skin
and then
calm
then
you aren't you
so you're happy

you can't not be happy when you look like how you actually ******* feel

the sensation of being ripped out of your own skin, then
isn't bad
because it's not your skin anymore
it's that freaks' skin
you're not a freak

right?

Born a boy...
Baseball, music, skateboards...
Puberty comes and goes...
Suicidal thoughts...
The only answer to stop the pain...
Too scared to follow through...
18 and life, my body is a prison...
My body breaks mirrors...
Dysphoria, a word never heard...
Lost, never knowing why...
Alcohol finds me...
The perfect medication...
I laugh, I live...
It hides all the pain...
Year after year...
It's all i know..
There's still something inside...
Something pushing...
Calling, wanting to get out...
It got to be too much...
Then eighteen months ago...
The pain got too much...
My liver was destroyed...
I thought it was the end...
I met a person...
Heard the word transgender...
Some others took me...
Taught me, cared for me...
One day the light came on...
After all these years of tears...
The answer was so simple...
All the pieces fit perfectly...
I was transgender, and never knew...
Now I'm free...
Im so happy for the first time to be me...
I'm transgender..!

A male child born, ***-wise,
His mind not made-up,
Not by a long shot.
He needs time to grow,
For now he could dress
Like Oscar Wilde,
Anyway's good for this child.
At six he follows
Male role models,
So confused.
Dysphoria soon insists,
Sets in to ambiguity,
Leading him to his feminine side,
Where her gender surely resides.

The sensations take over for a time
Not quite enjoyment but a need
Flesh calling out for release
I give in eventually
Begging for this one to be different
Hoping that maybe I can just pretend for a while
Its always in the back of my mind
Exhausted I finally achieve
****** duly owed to instinct

Before the end is reached
Shame washes over me
Disappointment seeps through my entire being
I will never have the parts I desire

Acutely aware of the flesh pushing down on my chest
Accentuating every movement
The tiny nub between my fingers
Will never be big enough for my desire
The twitching hole that will never be closed
That will never supply pleasure

The tears begin to track down the sides of my face
Filled with anger, shame, disappointment and disgust
Brokenness from being entirely the wrong thing

How can I ask anyone to accept my body
When I can't even accept it myself?

I wrestled with the black sea
that brood inside of her,
but nothing I possessed
could stop that dark tide
from taking her.

'A profound state of unease or dissatisfaction.'

I can understand that.
I ache.
My body twitches with the unseen tremors
     of muscles that were never there.

And sometimes my fingers and skin
fool me -
     wrinkles fade into existence
     as my body is at once
     too large and too small for
     the galaxies burning within.

A Sudden feeling
crushing, overwhelming
It’s everywhere, surrounding
No escape, no distraction
No denial.
It’s real then.
Then and forever
and you’ll never forget
never really escape.
It’s a forever thing.

When I attempt to think about my future, I know I can't. I know, I can only do what I can now to piece together my future like a puzzle. I want to get on T, I want to cut my hair shorter than my parents allow, I want more body modifications, I want to have a completely flat chest, but at the moment, I can't imagine what I'd turn into. A butterfly I'm not able to picture yet. I am at the moment, a small catapillar, not being able to pass for the gender I wish. She's. Hers'. That's not what I want directed towards me. I wants he's and they's. Male and neutral term are what I want my friends to use. Not my birth name, Kit. Kit Lucas Zachary is what I'll become when I get older and scrounge the money together to make that change possible. I must change myself and bold myself into what I want to be happy, even if that means I lose people, I can deal. If they don't agree with how I feel, they don't need to be in my life anyway. I can't say that I'm a boy yet, I can't say I'm pansexual yet. The violence that is occurring against my LGBTQ+ people locks my lips together to my parents, and possibly some of my friends, because I don't want them to be my demise. In this hick state of Texas. My chest binder must be put up due to high summer tempatures, it's too hot to have on so I can't feel at home in my own body. I hate my feminine face, and my father uses double standard, making me shave, making me feel naked and incorrect. I feel incomplete, like I haven't had my right growth spirt, my right puberty. "Oh yeah, she-" makes me want to put a bullet in my head, but it I pulled the trigger I know my family wouldn't understand why. "Hey girl!" don't look, don't turn, they aren't talking about you. But, once I'm an adult with a steady income, I hope to become the person I wish to be.

This heart isn’t hallow
This emptiness is just
As full as it can get
Like drowning a sealed
Water bottle full of
Oxygen

My heart breathes like a water boarding
Screams for first dates
That don’t come
Crushes over girls
Who ask me out to coffee so
They can brag about having coffee
With a cute guy to me
While the two of us
Have coffee

Smile
Do not show the hallow
Do not let the wind being knocked out of you
Whistle off of your rib cage
Like love notes being shredded

Remember
This is just coffee
Don’t pay attention to the fact that
Coffee hardly ever happens
Don’t pay attention to the fact that
You’ve literally had a crush on this girl since
Before you actually met her
Don’t pay attention to the fact that
There might not ever be another
Coffee

Remember
This is just your life
They don’t write love stories for hallowed out hearts
Or at least hearts that are only full of an outlining
Of oxygen
With skin singed from dysphoria
I hear it’s not good theater
If the main character looks like
A burn victim—
A bit indistinguishable
Like someone threw
Scalding coffee over your gender
Or tried to fill your heart with it

Breathe

Remember getting over her
It wasn’t hard
After all
It was just coffee
And it wasn’t like you
Had hope to fill your heart with
It was too full of out-linings
It’d be like stuffing a net with sand
Or trying to pour coffee into a
Shattered cup

Breathe

Let the broken shards of the
I-guess-this-really-is-just-coffee cups
Fill your lungs
It’s easier than breathing in another night
Of lonely
At least then you know
There was coffee
And glasses that fell apart
In tune with the shattering
Of your heart
So human
To lose something
By breaking it

Breathe

Remember
There was another coffee
And another girl
And this time we didn’t drink
From busted cups
But in something sturdy
Like a glass of hugs
That held the future of more time together
And had teabags of hope attached to strings
Of fingers that interlocked with hers
On the couch during our
Second date

My god
I know we had on shoes
With rubber souls
But that night your
Fingertips felt electric
Like a coffee cup with
An outlet in it
And the fork of my fingers found
The shock inside of you
It was warm like
Body heat
Or setting yourself on fire
*******
I never knew holding hands could make
My burned heart
Feel like a bonfire
Of shredded love notes
And shattered cups

I squeezed your hand a bit too hard
Like ripping coffee out of a sponge
I hoped you didn’t feel
How desperately I needed to hold
Onto the lifeboat rope of your arm
Because I’ve been drowning
In shards of glass from
I-guess-this-really-is-just-coffee cups
My whole life

I wish that second dates
Came with instruction manuals
Because I had no idea what to do
So at 2am
When you said you needed to leave
I walked you out to your car
And while I never read an instruction manual
I know that was the right move
Because you turned
And smushed your face into mine
Like I was stealing cotton candy in my mouth

I’m glad you were a good kisser
Because I know that kissing cotton candy
Has to be awkward as ****
But I hope that you at least found
Something sweet somewhere between
My lips

My god
How great a thief you were
When I checked my breath
The next morning
It was gone
Electrocuted from my lungs
And now I knew why kids
Keep shoving forks
Into outlets
It’s because the electric feels ******* incredible
Like taking a bath in oxygen
Or drowning in an ocean of inhales
Or fighting off a horde of dragons by
******* breathing on them

So Breathe

Remember
Cotton candy may seem sweet
But it doesn’t last forever
Eventually
Everyone can’t bare to have
Another bite

Awkward-at-first-kisses became
Awkward kisses
Breath kept coming home early
And dragons began to breathe
Back at me

I wasn’t surprised when you told me
You started seeing someone
It made sense
I always kept too many dragons around
With screaming hearts
And shattered coffee cups
Burning everything

I wasn’t surprised when I cried that day
It made sense
I had all of my oxygen back now
It was the only kind of breath
I knew

You see, oxygen flows through the heart and
Circles through the veins
I know oxygen
Like shattered coffee cups
And broken hallows
Filled with oceans of air

I guess that’s why
I set my heart on fire
Because maybe
It was never
There.

Everything stands frozen for an enternity, encapsuled in just a moment of time
Your notice your heart stops beating, the rhythm that has sustained you long before you were aware
Your throat constricts, suddenly unable to draw in the oxygen that feeds your body

Your next breath stagnates inside your lungs, decomposing with each missing heartbeat
Your stomach plummets towards the floor, falling further than the earths crust
Your intestines squirm inside your cavity as they disintegrate into nothingness

As your eyes begin to sting and water, overfilling until they breech the dam
Your heart finally remembers to beat, faster than ever before
And your jaw finally falls, along with the rest of your face to form a silent

"oh"

Washing over, it is a surprise
No noticeable trigger, even in retrospect
Nothing, and then BAM
A brick wall built in a moment as you step forwards
Hard to describe, my pen rusty from sitting tucked up in a drawer for so long
First I am me
Then me but not the same
How to define that inbetween?
Inconstant, shifting without warning
Dizzying to experience, shifts my emotions sideways
The one who laughs the loudest needs hope,
The one who is the rock needs stabilising
Or else TIP down as the little stones beneath shift around,
Down the cliff from the plateau
Leaving everyone else to cling to the rockface
How do I tell you that SHE makes me feel sick
When it had no effect yesterday?
It isn't he, nor always she, but neither ze nor they.
I am more than IT but less than she
How to tell you that she isn't me?
She was yesterday, the day before,
Today I am only me, as of 22:34
Tomorrow who knows?
But how to explain.

The battle of clothes.
Yesterday, curves accentuated
Today, too tight chest
Tool loose waist too tight hips
Nothing fits except the tears which spring to my eyes
Ever more easily.
Staining my cheeks, my sleeve sodden
I face the world and smile, laugh the loudest, help the most.
Nobody sees me crumble as i shift again,
Stagger slightly as it moves
Not back to where i once was,
But somewhere different once again.

My strength comes from me, but sometimes I can't help wishing I was  an elder daughter, a big sister, an average teenage girl.

That girl who smiles and laughs as you walk by?
Who you are jealous of?
She needs help more than most
The very word she can be jarring
But SHE smiles.

That clever girl who goes to the Catholic all girls around the corner?
Who you are jealous of?
Stupidity and cowardice to not be herself lie beneath.
Buries herself in schoolwork

That beautiful girl sits at a nearby table?
The one you are jealous of?
Beautiful is a dagger in her heart.
For she is not she nor he
Only somewhere in between
It is you these 'girls' are jealous of